


give the boy a purpose (how to make a monster)

by deerie



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-26
Updated: 2019-03-26
Packaged: 2019-12-18 10:43:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18248240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deerie/pseuds/deerie
Summary: The worst part, he thinks -- quietly, to himself, when no one else is awake -- is no longer having a purpose.





	give the boy a purpose (how to make a monster)

The worst part, he thinks -- quietly, to himself, when no one else is awake -- is no longer having a purpose. 

When the world first turns to ash, his purpose had been easy, simple: a push, a drive to get back to his own time, stop the apocalypse, save his family.

While the Commission had only been a stepping stone on that mission, it too gave him its own kind of purpose: kill the target, fix the timeline. Rinse, repeat. 

Kill the target. Fix the timeline. Get back to his own time. Stop the apocalypse. Save his family. 

In that order. 

He had done it, too. He’d killed so many targets that he was a legend at the Commission. He’d projected his consciousness forward to all points in time and then managed, somehow, to get back to the one he wanted the most. 

They stop the apocalypse, clumsily. They make too many mistakes. He makes too many mistakes, but -- there are no bodies to pick out of the rubble this time. His family is alive. 

Five thinks, however, that while he may have saved his family, there’s still a lot of fixing to be done. 

 

 

 

He doesn’t think he fits anymore. 

**Author's Note:**

> And then at a later point:
> 
> “You’re lucky,” Klaus says one day, inexplicably. 
> 
> Five tilts his head. “What do you mean?”
> 
> “You missed the parts where--” Klaus starts, then stops like he’s remembering that Five spent years and years in the apocalypse. “Where I was a shit brother.”
> 
>  
> 
> This is almost too short to post, but I figured why not? It was going to be part of a bigger piece where I explored all of their relationships and how they fit together post-apocalypse, but the other pieces didn't match the tone of this first part.


End file.
